


Nine Hundred

by supermagpie



Category: Marvel Cinematic Universe
Genre: Alternate Universe - Canon Divergence, Angst with a Happy Ending, Dadki and Sifmom, F/M, Kid Fic, Mostly Sifmom, Post-Avengers (2012)
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2014-12-23
Updated: 2014-12-23
Packaged: 2018-03-02 23:58:53
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 7,181
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/2830724
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/supermagpie/pseuds/supermagpie
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Sif has prided herself thus far upon control...</p>
            </blockquote>





	Nine Hundred

**Author's Note:**

  * For [TheLadySif](https://archiveofourown.org/users/TheLadySif/gifts).



> Hi TheLadySif! Merry Mistletoe! I hope that you like what I put together for you. I tried to combine a few of the things you asked for into a single canon-divergent AU. (I latched on to your mentions of Ullr being curious about his father, of Sif and Loki being awkward about being around each other and people not believing that they aren't into each other, and to your request about Loki not being provided a convenient excuse for his crimes.) I ended up sticking to Sif’s POV because I felt I got to tell the most interesting story in her voice and I wanted to give you the best fic I could within my constraints as a writer. There is some angst, some fluffy squish, and UST to be resolved. I deeply apologize if the ending is not as stellar as the beginning, I was a bit down to the wire and I will probably give this some small edits in the morning! (completed) Hope you have a happy holiday! - Zip

Sif has prided herself thus far upon control. Each day that passes wherein she holds her composure is its own small victory. She prefers the silence she has chosen to acknowledging the grief that claws in the pit of her stomach. If she gives such emotion even an inch it will have her, drag her down and not let her back up.

No one had known before he fell. They had begun in secret, continued in that way for it had suited them. There is no privacy quite like that afforded by others' assumptions. They had not always been tender to one another, their centuries spent as much in argument as intimacy at times, but there had been something sincere between them all the same. It does not seem right to betray their secret now.

Sif had loved Loki quietly and she will grieve him quietly, will not burden his family with her pain atop of their own.

The events that had unfolded in the great house were ugly from Thor’s description; Loki’s envy, his anger, far outstripping any estimation they might have made of it. Something else has gone on that her friend is not divulging but Sif does not have it in herself to press him for such details. She allows Thor his silence just as he allows her her own…

\-----

Sif does not expect audience with the family, does not expect Loki’s significant belongings distributed according his last wishes.

She has no warning to brace herself before a heap of golden hair is laid in her arms and her heart is in her throat, choking off the miserable wail that swells from the depth of her. All present - Thor, Frigga, Odin, guardsmen - glance at her askance, but for that brief moment Sif cannot care for the transparency of her pain.

She presses the bundle tightly to her chest and lets her tears spill.

\-----

Sif sits up late into the night staring at the coil of hair on the foot of her bed.

What is she to do with it all? Why would he leave her this? The questions chase one another around her mind. She has rarely missed her childhood gold, missed the horrid memory of Loki's lips stitched shut even less…

She turns it over in her hands for long hours, combs it smooth and twists it tight as if enough manipulation might reveal some hidden secret. It offers nothing to her but a longing for what she now shall never have.

In the early hours she weaves a braid in mourning pattern, loops the thin plait about her wrist, knots it snugly, and burns the rest.

\-----

The braid is still on her wrist weeks later as she stares down at the positive test clutched in her shaking fingers.

\-----

Loki is alive.

Sif does not know if it is anguish, relief or condition that makes her stomach roll with the knowledge. She has not shared her burden with any (though she is sure from the way he glances aside at her in the feast hall that Volstagg suspects). She does not know where to begin such a conversation, has no answers yet for the questions she will be asked.

She sees Loki again only briefly, passing as he is led to face Odin. She has no chance to talk to him, no idea if it would be worthwhile to do so at all, but their eyes meet for a too-long moment that leaves her heart in knots.

He has left thousands injured, hundreds dead, without cause. Thor has told her he was influenced by others, manipulated, but Sif sees more petulance than possession in the man that is led past her. His gaze is sharp, unclouded, reminds her too much of the Loki that had smiled and schemed at her side months ago. He smiles, fond and scathing at once, as they pass, and confusion only salts the wound of such an expression. She had had some inkling of his envy, had known at least that he had felt unfavoured, but he has expressed and seems to bear still an anger beyond her understanding.

The doors close at his back and Sif pauses at the hall's end, feeling something final in the heavy fall of the latch.

Loki is alive but lost to her still.

\-----

She tells Thor a week after Loki’s sentence is handed down. She pulls him aside into the quiet of her armoury dressing chamber, presses the point of his confidence, then watches his face melt from hesitance to realization to something close to horror as she talks. Her stomach twists, uneasy, at the reaction. Such a cruelty seems so unlike him...

“Is the match truly so foul a thought as that?”

“No no!” her friend protests, mastering his expression, though not by much. “I did not mean… it is only that..… it is Loki’s child?

“Yes.”

“You are certain?” he presses, worry creasing his brow now, and Sif’s stomach begins a full ferocious churn.

“He is, in fact, the only possible candidate.” she snaps, more agitated by the moment. “Why would I tell you such a thing were I not sure?” 

“Oh Sif…” Thor looks uneasy, unsteady...

When he explains, it is Sif who feels abruptly unstable.

She steps back once, again, even as Thor steps forward, reaching for her. She feels her knees give a threatening quaver that matches the roll of her stomach and her legs buckle in the same moment that she is sinking onto the dressing bench, arms folding around herself.

The frantic thought that she should have known is chased by the reasoning that she could not have. No one who knew had felt there any reason to tell her until now. If Thor’s word is true Loki _himself_ had not known the last time that they had touched.

It should be so much more difficult to believe than she finds it, but Thor is looking at her with grave concern and Sif is running through a thousand strange traits and differences in her mind, feeling more nauseous with every neatly made match. Loki’s anger is no small wonder in the face of such a revelation.

"Oh by the branches..." she bites her cheek against tears that are welling up at the corners of her eyes. Sif is not often afraid, but it is not often that she faces anything so wholly unknowable either. The arm around her middle squeezes, fingers digging at her tunic. She can conceive a half-Jotun child, clearly, but carry it to term? Birth it safely? To her knowledge the species have not intermingled before. No one will know how to care for her in bearing, to care for her child in growing. What if it arrives but does not live?

"...what's going to happen to my baby?"

Her voice is raw, uncomfortably small sounding to her ear, and Thor looks at her with an anguish that promises he has no answers.

\-----

Eir cannot offer concrete answers either, only the reassurance that she has been able to deduce treatments for Loki for many years of his growing and an eager welcome to the challenge that Sif now presents. The babe is growing well in Eir's estimation, a shade small but steadily advancing and showing all Aesir-like signs of health that should be seen.

“I cannot tell you to set aside all of your concerns but the stress of worry shall do you no favours.” The healer insists, patting Sif’s shoulder firmly. “Treat yourself well, come to me with what is strange, and we will see how things unfold.”

\-----

Even through the illusion she knows he has thrown she can sense his weariness.

The first she has seen him in months, the last she will see him for years most likely, and she knows not what to think of him. He is altered, that is clear. Thor did not lie about the touch of dark magic nor the influence of greater powers, but she does not sense the remorse of a man without any agency in his actions. Loki is bitterly sorry for his situation it seems, but less so than Sif might have hoped for the behaviour that brought him here. She cannot begrudge him his sense of betrayal - to be lied to for all of one's life is no trifling thing - but the extremity of his reaction, the innocent beings that bore the brunt of his following tantrum, is more than she can find sympathy for.

Still something in her aches when their eyes meet, wants to believe that she truly does see some faint spark of regret and longing there before he looks away again, armours himself anew with needling words.

"You look tired." His voice has a mocking lilt and Sif's thin lipped neutral expression takes on a sour tone. If he feels for her still it is not an emotion he chooses to cling to any longer.

"Perhaps that is because I am." She sighs, easing her attentive posture some. It is not as though she means to impress him.

"Worn down by your duties, lady?"

She hesitates a moment, steels herself to speak the words plainly. She came here with a purpose and does not wish to leave it unfulfilled.

"No. No, I am tired because I am pregnant."

There is a beat of silence and then the startled peal of his laughter, surprise shifting quickly to mocking. There is a bitterness beneath she can just barely register.

"Are you?" Loki sounds quite as disbelieving as the rest have. (Fandral had also laughed, though less and less the longer she had stared him down...)

"My my, congratulations. And who is the lucky lover to tether you by blood, Sif?"

Her voice remains soft and level for she has no ire to offer in response to his scathing tone.

"Loki, to be plain, if you were not the father I would not consider this to be your business."

The smirk melts off of his face, swept away like a sand tower slapped down by the lap of a wave, and he stares back at her, empty of wit for such a confession.

"Do not look so fearful." she says, for the tension of it is there in the slack of his mouth and the round of his eyes. "There is nothing you must do but live with the knowledge."

He has no answer for her, only stunned silence, though she can see that the reminder of his fate has registered upon his face. At once Sif does not care what response he might give at all for she too realizes that it cannot matter in any case. The choice has been made on their behalf.

He will remain here and she will raise a child in his absence.

\-----

Dedicated that she is to her choice so much of her pregnancy is wholly strange, and Sif finds it only stranger month by month.

Her moods are intense though rarely as irrational as she had feared. Far more frustration comes from the suddenly unfamiliar state of her body. She is over-hot no matter what her dress or location, utterly miserable through the summer. Poor balance and poorly distributed weight are a constant frustration and force her to accept far more help than she feels should be necessary.

Eir suspects she will carry longer than most, for Jotun form slowly by comparison to Aesir, and she is not wrong. Every week past the usual due drives Sif’s anxiety for the outcome a little higher. The gnawing fear that the child will not be well clings to her in every moment, steady kicks against her palm not quite enough to soothe her nerves.

Plenty have advice for the pain of labour, for the discomfort of its anticipation. None can tell her how to avoid the pain that could follow...

\-----

“What in the nine are you doing here?”

She is too wrung and out of sorts to deal with this, confusion and anger welling up in equal measure as Volstagg slides the door to the healing chamber shut in his wake. She very nearly throws something at him for stating the obvious, only doesn’t because she is rather busy holding her weight up on her hands...

“I came to stay with you.” he tells her, dropping his cloak over a spare chair and coming to the edge of her bed.   

“I know for fact that I told you I was perfectly fine on my own!”

The words are snarled, furious. She feels like strangling him, like crawling into a crevice in the earth and dying of humiliation, like dying in general as the next fierce wave of pressure chokes her breath and brings tears to her eyes.

Volstagg settles himself on the edge of her bed without word or invitation, cracks his knuckles, and pushes both fists in hard at either side of her spine

It is not much relief in the larger scheme, but more than she had expected from just a touch, enough to draw a pathetic gasping sound out of her, whole body shuddering as her muscles ease with the support of his counter-pressure.

“Sif, I have known you many years.” Volstagg says, repositioning his hand to push more firmly when she arcs and tenses against the peak of the contraction. “Certainly for long enough to know the difference between your sincerity and your stubbornness.”

His tone has a practised softness to it; admonishing her worry, her pride, though not her person.

“I have played the assistant’s role a time or six. I shall be glad to do it again.”

The worst of the pain begins to recede and Sif’s breath leaves her in a shuddering rush. The strangled small sound that she hates has returned to her voice even as she grips Volstagg’s offered hand with crushing pressure.

“If you stay I will not apologize for your wounds, physical or otherwise.”

Volstagg chuckles just a little as his palm works a soothing circle at the small of her back. “I hardly expected composure at such a time, Sif.”

\------

Sif gathers his small body to her chest, stroking soft slender limbs and the pale skin of his back, hushing his high shrieking cries even as she is weeping herself. She feels she could drown in the depth of her relief to hold him whole and healthy, to hear him gasp and cry as he should.

He has so much hair, all of it dark as her own (as his father’s), ears slightly pointed, pale skin tinged faintly blue until one of the healers tucks a blanket around him and a cap over the the crown of his head. His cries are piercing insistent things and Sif feels immediately more settled when he snuggles into her touch and quiets. She is exhausted, emotionally wrung and physically aching, but he seems to feel likewise, tiny chest heaving against her own as his breathing settles into an even pace.

She frees a hand to wipe the wetness from her face and clear her vision some. She is aware enough of Volstagg’s offered congratulations to give an appreciative hum in his direction but her focus remains upon the baby, taking in his tiny face and coiled limbs with intent affection.

“Hello finally.” she murmurs when whole words seem manageable again, still faintly trembling fingers brushing over his fine hair. Her son makes a soft noise, pursing his mouth against her shoulder, and Sif feels her heart fold itself over in knots. Nothing could ruin this. Not her discomfort, not her grief for what might have been… the world could fall around her and this moment still would be perfect.

“Does he have a name?”

The question pulls her attention, but only by half, her gaze still on his tiny face and the dark eyes that are peering sleepily up at her.   

“Ullr.”

\------

Her son looks like his father.

Loki has not seen Ullr once, Sif has not felt any need to take her baby into a prison to see a man who shall not be allowed to so much as hold him, but every day she can draw more and more similarity between her former lover and her child.

Others tell her that Ullr is like her, and they are not entirely wrong. He has some of her traits; her eyes, her nose, her boisterous energy and enthusiasm. But Sif does not see those things in him so easily as others do. Similarity to Loki screams at her from every smile….

It is not only in the blue tinge of his skin when the weather chills. It is his laugh, his grin, the curious way he pulls at everything in reach, how his mouth turns down into a pout when he is about to burst into tears.

Sif sees it herself, knows that Frigga sees it too for sometimes her expression will shift from joy to melancholy in a flash as her grandson is laughing in her arms.

It is only more pronounced the older he grows; a tall slender frame, tantrums that remind her of arguments she has had, pointed needling questions about hows and whys that pull her up short and make her consider before answering them. He has learned to pull a trick upon her before he is three hundred, something she is sure that no relative has instilled.

Some days she feels she is being haunted from a grave that was never reached, as if the ache of what could have been might swallow her up completely. (How can she miss so much of someone who lives and breathes? Someone whom she chooses not to see?) She worries the braid upon her wrist in such moments and waits for them to pass. No good can come of dwelling.

Thankfully, Ullr has - as his father once did - a fine knack for bringing a smile to her face.

\-----

“I am going to visit Loki at the week’s end. Perhaps it is time that I take Ullr along?”

She ought have expected that Frigga would one day advocate for such a thing but it still pulls Sif up short, the thought pressing a sharp point somewhere deep in her chest. She glances over at her son playing with the dog on the rug, sure he is out of earshot before assembling a response.

“Why would you wish such a thing now? After five hundred years your son has asked after his own?”

To be fair she had very nearly told him not to bother asking the first and last they had spoken of the child but that does not soften her irritation by much. Loki has had nothing to do with Ullr since the boy was born. Things are exactly as Sif expected and prepared for them to be. The thought of allowing him a sliver of the life she has built without him leaves her with the uneasy feeling of trying to make a bed for someone she is not sure she wishes to invite in at all. She has fought for years to put the aimless longing for a life with Loki in it behind her...

“Ullr has asked me if he may come along.” Frigga says gently and Sif feels her instinctive irritation soften some with the knowledge.

“He wonders why he has not met his father.”  
“I have explained to him that Loki is in prison and that prison is not a place for children.” Sif says with a shade of defensiveness. “Is that not adequate reason?”

“To one so young no answer is truly adequate. Ullr knows that I am going. He does not see why it would it be unsafe for him to visit if I were at his side.”

Sif buries her frown in the edge of her mug, for the point the Queen makes is as difficult to argue against as it is for her to appreciate, and Frigga sighs.

“Sif, I would not offer if I thought there were the faintest chance that harm would come to him. You know this, don’t you?”

“Of course I do.”

“One visit. To sate his curiosity at least. I would not force him to return if it goes poorly.”

Sif looks over again as Ullr climbs up from the rug, urging the dog after him as he darts into the hall, giggling the entire way. She can nearly hear Loki’s happy laugh in the echo.

“...perhaps.”

\----

“Your grandmother tells me that you want to go along with her to see Loki.”

Ullr’s tousled head is nodding even as his face is still half-obscured by his night-shirt. Sif finishes tugging it down around his shoulders for him, kneeling down to help him to thread his arms through each sleeve.

“Can I, Mama? Grandmama says she likes visiting him. I want to visit too.”

“He will not be expecting you.” Sif cautions, smoothing out his hair.

"I'll be a surprise!"

"Ullr-" her tone is apparently too hesitant for her son to bear.

"Mama I want to meet him!"

The snap of emotion in his voice catches Sif off guard and makes her sit back upon her heels. Ullr's lower lip trembles but the frustration that overflows in his words is stronger than his urge to cry.

"Signud's parents are not together but she can see her mother when she wants, can't she? My friends can see all of their parents so why not me?!"

The easy answer that Sif wants to offer is absent, the way he looks at her, confused and wounded, cutting to the quick.

“If you go you must not do so expecting that he will immediately behave to you as a father would, darling. He has not had to practice being fatherly before.”

“I know that, Mama!” Ullr insists, exasperated in the way of a child who absolutely does not know but does not care to know either. Only experience can shatter the hopeful illusion of who his father might be.

Sif has never liked the moments in which she must allow Ullr to encounter the world as it is and not as she has made it to be for his benefit. She can hope that Loki will love him, will see himself in that smile and want to get to know his son, but life (he) has taught her that there are no guarantees. She is not sure how such a meeting will unfold, but she - and Ullr - will never know unless she allows it to happen in the first place.

“Alright. If you wish to go you may.”

\----

Ullr bounds across the threshold between kitchen and sitting room, cloak and boots still on, a mile ahead of Frigga who is only arriving at the front steps in his wake. He looks fit to burst with excitement. Sif has not seen such an expression upon his face since she had handed him his first practice blade...

“It went so well as that did it?” she asks, relief and surprise colouring her voice, and Ullr nods, bouncing on the balls of his feet as he sheds his satchel and begins to pull out the books he had packed and pass them over to show her.

“Father read three whole books to me and Grandmama! He read my favourite one about the ravens, and this story about the rivers, and this one about the elves.” - a book is deposited into her arms with each description - “I want to go again next week! Father said he wants me to come. Can I please?!”

Now that she is forced to entertain the thought Sif can picture such a moment all too easily; Ullr perched upon Loki’s knee, the curious thoughtful look that he makes over a book echoed upon his father’s face. It should not rattle her so, for she has spent years divorcing herself from the hope of such of a thing, but still the image that forms in her mind makes her heart squeeze painfully and her fingers itch to worry the braid at her wrist. It is hard to know for a moment if the thought has made her happy or sad.

Frigga, having reached the living room archway, simply shrugs her shoulders in a helpless gesture when Sif glances in her direction. The Allmother’s contented smile speaks as much of the afternoon as Ullr’s eager pleading.

“I suppose you shall have to visit again then,” Sif says. “And bring a few more books.”

\-----

Ullr accompanies Frigga every week.

He comes home full of stories, brimming with an excitement that Sif has not seen in him before. He gushes about how much he enjoys the visits, happily tells his friends of how his father has read to him as their fathers do. How they have played games with cards and dice and magic and talked about all sorts of things.

Sif has no objection she can offer to such happiness. It is clear to her that Ullr has a friend in his father, if nothing else, and that Loki’s presence has filled a void in her son's life that she had not known the depth of. She has endeavoured to be sure that there are men worth looking up to in her son's life but the indulgent attentions of Thor and Volstagg, of Sif's own father and brother, have clearly not been a proper fit. There is a kindredness of spirit between Ullr and Loki that Sif feels she ought have expected but finds instead a pleasant surprise.

Sif does not often witness their visits herself. At first she cannot bring herself to close the distance that she has grown used to keeping between she and the second prince; it feels simply too raw a thing to confront. But Frigga tells her time and again that Loki is happier for having Ullr’s company and finally comes the day that Sif is Ullr's escort, stuck carrying all the books as her son charges ahead to Loki’s chamber.

Sif can see the truth of the Allmother's words before Loki has even noticed she is there. The affection in his smile as Ullr barrels headlong into his arms is whole and unabashed. He gathers the boy onto his knee, squeezes both arms around him in return… and only then spies her standing at the edge of the room.

His smile melts into something unreadable, stunned, almost as she had left him the last they spoke, and Sif finds her heart in her throat once again. There is a moment of tense quiet, Ullr glancing between the two of them, before Loki redirects his gaze to the boy, dodging the intensity of her stare.

“I was not expecting you, lady.” he says after a moment.

“Your mother was unavailable, I'm afraid.” she answers, stepping a little closer, the book bag tapping against her knees.

“I thought I would bring MY mama instead.” Ullr clarifies, looping his arms around Loki’s neck for another squeeze. “That’s okay right?”

“Of course.” Loki murmurs, hand pressing gently on Ullr’s back, looking up at her again over the boy’s shoulder. “Your lady mother is quite welcome.”

“I shall not meddle.” she promises, passing the bag of books to Ullr as he reaches eagerly for it. “I am only here to observe.”

She finds a seat at the edge of the room and unfolds her own reading but for the entire hour her eyes wander steadily to father and son pressed together on the chaise across from her. The reality of the image is more precious than her imagination could have made it, fills her with that ache she has tried so hard to banish...

Loki, she knows, can be a deceptive creature, but Sif feels not the slightest hint of insincerity, nor any sense that he is merely offering especially good behaviour on account of her presence.

Only for love would someone read the raven story four times over in one sitting, with voices.

\-----

More and more days she worries the braid.

Sif thinks she has been lied to.

If seven hundred years cannot heal her wounds she is not sure that time will ever do anything for them at all.

\-----

Paroled.

It is the first word from Ullr’s mouth as he comes rushing to meet her at the gates and Sif feels her throat constrict as his hand presses into hers.

“Do you know what it means?!” He is nearly vibrating with excitement, bouncing upon his toes as they begin to walk. “It means Father will not be in prison any more!” he crows, delight pouring out every inch of him.

“He said that he will have to follow some extra rules but not that many. He will be allowed to come and play with me outside! We can do all sorts of things!”

“Well.” Sif lets her breath out slowly, squeezing Ullr’s hand gently. She needs the squeeze he will give back far more than he needs any comforting, clearly. “That will be lovely, won’t it? I am sure he is as excited as you are.”

“Will Father come to watch me in the yards when he is free?” Ullr asks, clinging still to her hand as he steps awkwardly alongside her, studiously avoiding placing his boot across any of the cracks between the paving stones.

“If you ask him nicely, perhaps he might.” Sif says, watching the path ahead on Ullr’s behalf.

"Will he come to watch you too?"

Sif chuckles. "He has seen enough of me in a fight to know my skill, dear."

“You must have gotten better since the last time he saw you though.” her son insists. “I know you have. You’re better since last week even! Won’t he want to see how good you are now?”

Sif pauses, for she recognizes that phrasing quite exactly, and Ullr merely smiles in his slightly sly way when she raises a brow at him for paraphrasing her own encouragement of his reading.

"Perhaps he will watch me too then, yes."

"Can I take him to get ice-cones, after mama?"

"I suppose you might."

"Can he come home for dinner too? Oh OH! Mama mama could he live with us!?"

Sif winces at the question, for she had so hoped to avoid it, and tugs gently upon Ullr’s hand until he stops walking. She crouches down where she can meet his gaze, his small body framed by her knees. She rests one hand on his shoulder, pets the other through his dark hair.

“Ullr, my love, I know that you are excited for your father to be free. You have waited a very long time for such a day. I am glad that you will be able to spend proper time with him and show him your favourite places at last, but you cannot expect us all to share your anticipation.”

"You aren't excited he will be paroled? You like Father don't you?"

“Your father and I have not been close in that way since well before you were born, Ullr.” she says gently, loathing the way his brow creases and his smile fades at her words. “I know that you fancy the thought of it, but please do not dedicate yourself to the hope that Loki will share your home and become exactly the sort of father to you that others have. I cannot promise you such a thing, nor can he. We both love you dearly, my son, but that does not mean that we love each other by extension. Do you understand?”

He pins her with a wary look, one that tells her that her words have not sunk in as deeply as she would like, but nods nonetheless.

“Yes mama.”

\-----

She can tell, no matter his acknowledgement, that Ullr does not believe there is no feeling left between she and his father.

The longer that Loki is free the less Sif can defend such a theory.

She cannot know certainly how Loki feels, they have talked too little for that, but the way he looks at her when they meet is piercing and intent, gives her some ghost of the feeling that his loving gazes had once. He greets her each time they encounter one another with that achingly familiar half-smile that had once always covered for his nervousness, and her stomach flutters at the sight as if she were young again.

Ullr is eager to spend his time with Loki and so such encounters become frequent things, tense smiles across the threshold of her kitchen door and Ullr’s delighted glances darting between them with each quiet ‘hello’. It does not take long for Ullr to grasp Loki’s hand during one such encounter and bring up the subject of the yards.

“You should come to watch me practice my sword and shield Father.” he insists, swinging Loki’s hand in his own. “Mama always comes to see me!”

Loki looks across at Sif as if unsure that he is welcome in such a place, one brow slightly raised in a silent bid for her opinion.

It is not wise, spending time with him will only make a mess of her emotions, but one excited smile from Ullr, the hopeful glint in Loki’s gaze, and her will to deny such a thing is immediately undone.

“You should come to see him. He’s very good.”

\-----

When Loki first joins her at the yard railing Ullr is all that they discuss; his form with sword and shield, his ever increasing height, his cleverness and the cheeky smile that matches it.

They are safe, civil conversations, neutral and mutually interesting, but there are only so many topics for them to tread and retread.

Finally sentiment creeps up upon her, pulls the wistful words from her lips as they are pondering, together, Ullr’s features.

"He has always reminded me of you."

Loki turns his head toward her, gaze curious, expression strangely soft with surprise, and Sif feels her cheeks flush at the attention.

"Is that so?" He asks after a moment.

"You have not noticed? He has looked like you since he was only small."

"How strange that you would see it that way, my lady." Loki murmurs, a teasing smile tugging at the corner of his mouth. "He has always reminded me of you."

\-----

An ease has settled in in place of her ache that Sif feels she should know better than to trust.

She has reasoned with herself time and again that she no longer knows Loki. That her heart has been handed to a ghost. There are too many years of change between the man she has pined for and the Loki of now.

But the Loki of now has simply too many aspects that appeal to her…

He seems mellowed by nearly a millennia of reflection, the calm calculation that a young Loki could only sometimes offer a common practice now. He is handsome as he ever was in youth, hair flecked with sparing threads of silver and eyes creased by grins.

It is through Ullr that Loki has undermined her defenses the most, certainly, for his dedication to their child has been complete. He appears often exhausted by Ullr’s demands upon him - to be so social, so active, after years locked away is surely a shade overwhelming - but never does he shirk a reasonable request. He arrives rain or shine to the yards to watch over every practice, and Sif soon finds that she can rely on him both for an umbrella and a conversation.

Worst of all, he can still make her laugh, make that nervous fluttering bubble up beneath her ribs with just a smile. He does not bait and barb at her with quite the roughness of their youth, but he has not lost his wit in the process. His observations are still scathing in the way that makes her wince and laugh in the same breath. He can still banter back and forth with her about the things that irritate them both.

Some part of Sif wishes that he would stop, cease to make himself seem so settled and appealing. Her son has noticed lingering looks and long conversations (has paid more attention to she and Loki than to his lessons for all the observations he seems to enjoy making about their interactions).

“I think you like him mama.” He tells her one night as she is tucking him into bed, grinning at her knowingly from behind the edge of his covers.

“And why is that my son?”

“You smile when you see him at the yards.”

Sif pauses in tucking the covers around him, peering down at him in surprise.

“I do?” She has not meant to, has strived not to be so open in her feelings as that.

“It’s okay, Mama.” Ullr reassures her, small hand darting out to pat her arm. “He smiles when he sees you there too.”

\-----

Where nine hundred entire years of her life has gone Sif is not quite sure, but as Ullr approaches his name day and preparations for a fine party in celebration of the milestone unfold, Sif finds herself dwelling upon the question. It seems both a moment and a life-time since the first that she held him. Surely only a child can make near to a millennia feel so short...

Ullr writes his father’s name and address out on an invitation with special delight, knowing that for the first time it is more than ceremony to send it.

Loki's acceptance arrives without delay.

\-----

Nine hundred is no small achievement of age and Ullr’s relatives and friends treat it with an appropriate importance. The table in the great house is heaped with more gifts than Sif feels are entirely necessary, and more food than seems possible for them to eat. The room is just as full of people, the banter of adults and chatter of children blending with music to build a raucous atmosphere.

It is no surprise to Sif that halfway through the party Loki has vanished from the sea of faces to take some breathing space. She, though far more social, feels the need for a little of her own.

The sitting room attached to the dining hall is her first guess to his hiding place, and the correct one. He has found himself a space beside the window, watching fat flakes of snow fall on the terrace outside. There is a weariness about his expression that Sif finds she dislikes.

She joins him by the sill as he so often has joined her by the rail, setting one of the mugs of mead she is bearing down beside his hand. Loki does not look toward her, but he reaches for it anyway, taking a slow sip before properly acknowledging her.

"...you always did have a knack for finding me when I wished not to be found."

"I have retained most of the skills you would remember me to have, yes. Do I also still know what you like to drink?"

He nods, drawing another deeper mouthful from the mug before turning properly to face her. His eyes skim over her frame, something tired and longing in his gaze, and Sif swallows hard at the sight of it..

“Thank you my lady.” he says finally, resting the mug upon the sill again.

They stand in silence a moment, watching the snow fall before Loki speaks again.

“Are they still stuck upon games?”

“Oh yes.” Sif sighs. “Chairs now, then drums, then presents. Then stories, I assume.” she glances aside at Loki then, wondering if any thought to offer him the chance. “Will you tell one? You certainly may if you like.”

Loki looks at her with a faint smile as if the idea strikes him funny. “Perhaps I ought, show how convincing I may make a fabrication. Every time I tell a story Ullr pesters me if it is true. I have told him of it, as have others surely, but still he seems not to believe my reputation as a liar at all, Sif.”

"Consider, Loki, that by virtue of time spent and necessity, I have been the greater liar to his ears." She teases, for the idea makes her smile. "You are more fun, for you have never told him sincerely that he would like vegetables."

"My Lady, you do me grave injustice by the thievery of my title. What is Loki but a liar?"

"A man, a magician." She hums, thoughtful. "Son and father and brother. Deception is not all of you."

"Liar suits me best," he murmurs, clearly caught off-guard by her response.

Sif shakes her head, for his words do not ring true to her ear.

“I do not hear you lie so often, these days.”

“...perhaps you do not.”

The admission is quiet, Loki’s attention fixed for a moment upon his drink. When he sets it aside and looks up at her his eyes are scrutinizing, curious and cautious all at once.

"I have missed you."

The words strike her like a blow, dig beneath her ribs and press the breath from her lungs. Her mouth opens but sound does not come, only her slack surprised expression and the faintly confused tilt of her head.

“You have lived well without me.” he continues, his gaze flickering over to the door, to Ullr beyond it and nine hundred well lived years being celebrated. “I am glad of that. You and he deserved that happiness. But I have missed so much of it Sif. Of Ullr, and of you. I find myself sorry for it.”

She is not accustomed to seeing such regret upon his face, finds she likes it even less still than his melancholy. Loki Liesmith wounds her most with his honesty.

Sif lets herself lean upon the sill, draws in a breath and lets it out again before words find her. Missed. Missed her as she has missed him...?

“I have lived well enough, but it does not rob me of my life's blessings to admit there could have been more of them.” she says quietly, one hand crossing over to the other, worrying the mourning braid from beneath her sleeve. The strands are worn and frayed by her fingertips, slip free from her wrist more easily than they could have years ago.

Recognition takes a moment to reach his face, but as it does his expression crumples into something almost distraught.

"That is... "

"You have haunted me." She swallows, playing the loop between thumbs and fingers. "I have grieved your person, then your presence, then your potential... it has felt unending at times."

"Sif..."

The way he looks at her echoes every longing she has felt for nine hundred years, makes her almost startle when he touches her, squeezing her hand in cool fingers. What can she gain from resisting now, knowing they have both pined for a lifetime?

"I have missed you too. Very much."

She pulls his hand closer, lays the bracelet in his palm and folds his fingers over it.

"Perhaps now that you are here with me I ought to stop."

 


End file.
